DESCRIPTION: Highly advanced heavy cruiser developed for a campaign set after the Zahn novels NAME: Nova Dreadnaught CRAFT: Rendili Astronautics' Nova-Class Dreadnaught TYPE: Heavy Cruiser SCALE: Capital LENGTH: 800m SKILL: Astrogation 3D, Capital ship piloting 4D+2, Shields, 4D+1, Sensors 4D+2, Capital ship gunnery 4D+2, Capital ship gunnery 5D (central gunnery crew) CREW: 2010; gunners: 280; skeleton: 900/+5 PASSENGERS: 5000 troops CARGO CAPACITY: 5000 tonnes CONSUMABLES: 2 years HYPERDRIVE: x2 BACKUP: x15 NAV COMPUTER: Yes MANEUVERABILITY: 1D SPACE: 6 HULL: 6D SHIELDS: 3D SENSORS: PASSIVE: 30 / 1D SCAN: 75 / 2D SEARCH: 150 / 3D FOCUS: 5 / 3D+2 WEAPONS: 30 Heavy Turbolasers Fire Arc: 5 front, 5 back, 10 left, 10 right. Crew: 3 Skill: Capital ship gunnery Fire Control: 3D Space Range: 3-15 / 35 / 75 Atmosphere Range: 3-15 / 35 / 75km Damage: 7D 80 Laser Cannons Fire Arc: 20 front, 10 back, 25 left, 25 right. Crew: 1 Skill: Starship gunnery Scale: Starfighter Fire Control: 1D Space Range: 1-3 / 12 / 25 Atmosphere Range: 100-300m/ 1.2 / 2.5km Damage: 5D 25 Concussion Missiles Fire Arc: 10 front, 5 back, 5 left, 5 right. Crew: 2 Skill: Capital ship gunnery Fire Control: 2D Space Range: 2-12 / 30 / 60 Atmosphere: 4-24 / 60 / 120km Damage: 9D 15 Ion Cannons Fire Arc: 3 front, 2 back, 5 left, 5 right. Crew: 2 Skill: Capital ship gunnery Fire Control: 4D Space Range: 1-5 / 15 / 30 Atmosphere Range: 2-10 / 30 / 60km Damage: 4D This space vessel has been modeled on the concepts behind the Katana fleet. They have been extensively slave rigged, with huge internal computer banks, centralising ship systems and also providing backup systems in case one particular computer system fails. All capital-scale weapon sytems are linked in providing exceptional fire control and the ability to be readily linked together, by a central gunnery crew of 15 to accurately fire on a target with all the weapons of one weapon system facing the target. Also, several of these vessels may be linked together after permission has been granted by the crews aboard the individual ships to fire upon a target, as directed by a crew aboard one of the vessels. Thus in large numbers, these ships could be quite damaging. Another feature is that the ships can be linked together, after permission has been given by the individual command crews, to make coordinated hyperspace jumps. This allows a fleet of these vessels to jump to hyperspace and arrive with precision timing and precisely positioned, ready for combat. IN GAME TERMS: Ship may perform a 'free' combined action (no command check) to attack a target with all weapons on one fire arc for one weapon system. Basically, the central gunnery crew takes over control of these weapons and fires them as one. This may be done as often as the weapons can be fired. When linking ships, the central ship must send a signal to all of the ships to be linked, then the other ships must acknowledge this. This occupies all of the central gunnery crews for that round, after that, the central ship may fire with all the weapons facing and within range of the target on all linked ships as a combined action. The ships may be at different ranges, but if they are, the difficulty is that of the ship at greatest range plus 5. The central may continue to use all the weapons until it sendes the disengage signal, or the individual central gunnery crews disengage their ship from the link. These vessels also carry 2 sqaudrons of starfighters, along with drop craft and vehicles for the troops aboard. The New Republic was searching for more companies to build it more heavy cruisers, but it found that there were few around capable of the job. So the Republic set about creating a new one. They chose the name Rendili after the the company that once built the grand Victory Star Destroyers and the classic Dreadnaught for the Old Republic, although they gave it the new official title of Rendili Astronautics. The aging engineer of the former Rendili, designer of the Victory Star Destroyer and the A-Wing, Walex Blissex, was named chief of engineering for the new firm and given the task of building up a team to design the starcraft of the future. Lando Calrissian, who is noted for his excellent entrepreneurial skills was placed in the position of Director of the company. Together they built up a team, wooing small groups of engineers from the New Republic military, the Mon Calamari, Corellian Engineering and some other small time operations. They combined them with the best graduates from engineering schools in New Republic space, and a few defecting Imperial Engineers to create a talented and eager design team. With funding from the New Republic government and under tight security, a large shipbuilding firm was established, hidden in a corner of New Republic space. Its first design off the production run was the Nova-Class Dreadnaght, followed shortly by a slightly modified version to perform a similar function to the Imperial Interdictor cruiser.